Best of
Comix

2009

Ender's Shadow: Battle School


Mike Carey - 2009
    This is a tale of street smarts, survival instincts and the inevitable meeting with the Interstellar Fleet's battle-hardening school for children, where Ender Wiggin holds court as rising star.

Asterios Polyp


David Mazzucchelli - 2009
    An epic story long awaited, and well worth the wait. Meet Asterios Polyp: middle-aged, meagerly successful architect and teacher, aesthete and womanizer, whose life is wholly upended when his New York City apartment goes up in flames. In a tenacious daze, he leaves the city and relocates to a small town in the American heartland. But what is this “escape” really about? As the story unfolds, moving between the present and the past, we begin to understand this confounding yet fascinating character, and how he’s gotten to where he is. And isn’t. And we meet Hana: a sweet, smart, first-generation Japanese American artist with whom he had made a blissful life. But now she’s gone. Did Asterios do something to drive her away? What has happened to her? Is she even alive? All the questions will be answered, eventually.In the meantime, we are enthralled by Mazzucchelli’s extraordinarily imagined world of brilliantly conceived eccentrics, sharply observed social mores, and deftly depicted asides on everything from design theory to the nature of human perception.Asterios Polyp is David Mazzucchelli’s masterpiece: a great American graphic novel.

Picture This: The Near-Sighted Monkey Book


Lynda Barry - 2009
    The R. R. Donnelley and Eisner Award–winning book posed, explored, and answered the question: "Do you wish you could write?" Now with Picture This, Barry asks: "Do you wish you could draw?" It features the return of Barry's most beloved character, Marlys, and introduces a new one, the Near-Sighted Monkey. LikeWhat It Is, Picture This is an inspirational, take-home extension of Barry's traveling, continually sold-out, and sought-after workshop, "Writing the Unthinkable."

Sleeper: Season One


Ed Brubaker - 2009
    Holden Carver is also an agent of global spy group International Operations, working in deep cover. But the only person who knows his secret is lying in a coma.

Sleeper Season Two


Ed Brubaker - 2009
    While spymaster John Lynch slept in a coma, his protégé Holden Carver was trapped undercover. Now that his star has risen in criminal mastermind Tao's organization, Carver is shocked by the news that Lynch is awake. Torn between new loyalties and his original mission, Carver must decide whose side he's really on – and if they're on his.This collection features SLEEPER SEASON TWO #1-12, the full second year of the critically acclaimed series by Brubaker and Phillips, plus the never-before-collected prequel story from COUP D'ETAT: AFTERWORD."SLEEPER could hold its own against any noir, from any medium...Brubaker is without a doubt the best crime fiction writer in comics today."--AIN'T IT COOL NEWS

Weathercraft


Jim Woodring - 2009
    He wants to go to celestial realms but instead altruistically returns to the unifactor to undo a wrong he has inadvertently brought about: The transformation of the evil politician Whim into a mind-destroying plant-demon who distorts and enslaves Frank and his friends. The new and metaphysically expanded Manhog sets out for a final battle with Whim...Weathercraft also co-stars Frank’s cast of beloved supporting characters, including Frank’s Faux Pa and the diminutive, mailbox-like Pupshaw and Pushpaw; it is both a fully independent story that is a great introduction to Woodring’s world, and a sublime addition to, and extension of, the Frank stories.Weathercraft will be a defining graphic novel of 2010.

The Big Book of Barry Ween, Boy Genius


Judd Winick - 2009
    What does a ten-year-old boy do with a 350 I.Q.? Anything he wants! Cranky, egotistical, arrogant, and foul-mouthed, Barry in general wants to conduct his experiments and be left alone, but it never seems to work out. Hurdles that Barry must outmaneuver range from time warps, to art thieves, to inter-dimensional warfare with gorillas, to accidentally turning his best friend into a dinosaur! This massive volume collects all three BARRY WEEN mini-series—12 issues in all—for a complete compilation of the hit series, THE ADVENTURES OF BARRY WEEN, BOY GENIUS.

Monsters


Ken Dahl - 2009
    Following his acclaimed collection of short comics, Welcome to the Dahlhouse, Ken Dahl cements his status as one of the best cartoonists of his generation with this brutally honest account of disease and self-acceptance.

Pim and Francie: The Golden Bear Days


Al Columbia - 2009
    Collecting over a decade s worth of artifacts, excavations, comic strips, animation stills, storybook covers, and much more, this broken jigsaw puzzle of a book tells the story of Pim & Francie, a pair of childlike, male and female imps whose irresponsible antics get them into horrific, fantastic trouble. Their loosely defined relationship only contributes to the existential fear that lingers underneath the various perils they are subjected to. Columbia s brilliant, fairytale-like backdrops hint at further layers of reality lurking under every gingerbread house or behind every sunny afternoon. Never have such colorful, imaginative vistas instilled such an atmosphere of dread, and with such a wicked sense of humor. This is a comprehensive collection of Columbia s Pim & Francie work, including paintings, comics, character designs, and much more, all woven into something greater than the sum of its parts, with Pim & Francie careening from danger to danger, threaded together through text and notes by the artist. This is the first book collection by Columbia, a well-regarded talent amongst longtime fans of the alternative comic book scene, and one who will thrill an entirely new audience with the singular, inspired, fully-realized fantasies within Pim & Francie.

Gahan Wilson: 50 Years of Playboy Cartoons


Gahan Wilson - 2009
    His work has been seen by millions—no, hundreds of millions—in the pages of Playboy, The New Yorker, Punch, The National Lampoon, and many other magazines; there is no telling, really, how many readers he has corrupted or comforted. He is revered for his playfully sinister take on childhood, adulthood, men, women, and monsters. His brand of humor makes you laugh until you cry. And it’s about time that a collection of his cartoons was published that did justice to his vast body of work.When Gahan Wilson walked into Hugh Hefner’s office in 1957, he sat down as Hefner was on the phone, gently rejecting a submission to his new gentlemen’s magazine: “I think it’s very well-written and I liked it very much,” Hefner reportedly said, “but it’s anti-sin. And I’m afraid we’re pro-sin.” Wilson knew, at that moment, that he had found a kindred spirit and a potential home for his cartoons. And indeed he had; Wilson appeared in every issue of Playboy from the December 1957 issue to today. It has been one of the most fruitful, successful, and long-lived relationships between a contributor and a magazine, ever.Gahan Wilson: 50 Years of Playboy Cartoons features not only every cartoon Wilson drew for Playboy, but all his prose fiction that has appeared in that magazine as well, from his first story in the June 1962 issue, “Horror Trio,” to such classics as “Dracula Country” (September 1978). It also includes the text-and-art features he drew for Playboy, such as his look at Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, his take on our country’s “pathology of violence,” and his appreciation of “transplant surgery.”Wilson’s notoriously black sense of comedy is on display throughout the book, leaving no sacred cow unturned (an image curiously absent in the book), ridiculing everything from state sponsored executions to the sober precincts of the nouveau rich, from teenage dating to police line-ups, with scalding and hilarious satirical jabs. Although Wilson is known as an artist who relishes the creepy side of modern life, this three-volume set truly demonstrates the depth and breadth of his range—from illustrating private angst we never knew we had (when you eat a steak, just whom are you eating?) to the ironic and deadpan take on horrifying public issues (ecological disaster, nuclear destruction anyone?).Gahan Wilson has been peeling back the troubling layers of modern life with his incongruously playful and unnerving cartoons, assailing our deepest fears and our most inane follies. This three-volume set is a testament to one of the funniest—and wickedly disturbing—cartoonists alive.Nominated for two 2010 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards (Best Archival Collection/Project: Strips; Best Publication Design).

Gears of War: Volume One


Joshua Ortega - 2009
    The best-selling video game franchise arrives in comic books stores with a blast - one month before the debut of the new Xbox 360 game! This story bridges the end of the first Gears of War game and the start of the second one, following the brutal adventures of Marcus Fenix and Delta Squad in the battle against the Locust! What happened after the Lightmass Bombing and how did the Locust react to this devastating weapon? Find out in this new series by Gears of War 2 game-writer Joshua Ortega (Death Dealer) and artist Liam Sharp (LORD HAVOK AND THE EXTREMISTS).

The Art of Emily The Strange


Rob Reger - 2009
    With roots in the punk-rock art scene of Santa Cruz skate culture and an early appeal to European trend spotters, the iconic image of Emily and her philosophy of devout individualism have become deeply rooted in global culture.The Art of Emily Volume One is the first-ever collection of images showing the wide and inspired range of artistic styles and mediums that have been used to create the world of Emily the Strange. From skateboard stickers to custom rock-and-roll album art, large-scale psychedelic paintings, and insanely intricate Mongolian paper cutting, the fantastic and artful imaginings of Rob Reger, Buzz Parker, and a staggeringly talented array of collaborators will give insight and inspiration to any Emily fan.

George Sprott, 1894-1975


Seth - 2009
    The events forming the patchwork of George’s life are pieced together from the tenuous memories of several informants, who often have contradictory impressions. His estranged daughter describes the man as an unforgivable lout, whereas his niece remembers him fondly. His former assistant recalls a trip to the Arctic during which George abandoned him for two months, while George himself remembers that trip as the time he began writing letters to a former love, from whom he never received replies.Invoking a sense of both memory and its loss, George Sprott is heavy with the charming, melancholic nostalgia that distinguishes Seth’s work. Characters lamenting societal progression in general share the pages with images of antiquated objects—proof of events and individuals rarely documented and barely remembered. Likewise, George’s own opinions are embedded with regret and a sense of the injustice of aging in this bleak reminder of the inevitable slipping away of lives, along with the fading culture of their days.

Low Moon


Jason - 2009
    Then, the wordless “” tells two tales at once: one about a skinny guy trying to steal enough money to save his ill mother, and the other about a fat guy murderously trying to woo his true love. The reason we follow these two parallel stories becomes obvious only on the very last page, in Jason’s inimitable genre-mashing style.“Early Film Noir” can best be described as The Postman Always Rings Twice meets Groundhog Day. But starring cavemen. And finally, “You Are Here” features alien kidnappings, space travel, and the pain and confusion of family ties, culminating in an enigmatic finale that rivals Jason’s greatest twists.Funny, poignant, and wry, Low Moon shows one of the world’s most acclaimed graphic novelists at the absolute peak of his powers.

The Transformers: All Hail Megatron, Volume 1


Shane McCarthy - 2009
    Their forces invade and control New York City where, before long, they manage to cripple the United States. It's a war between the armed forces of the United States of America and a giant species of technologically advanced killing machines — a war that suddenly becomes incredibly one-sided! Meanwhile, the battered and defeated Autobots are struggling to survive a forced exile on their dead homeworld of Cybertron. Defeated due to a traitor amongst their ranks, the Autobots struggle to maintain their trust and unity... and nothing short of a miracle will save them from utter extinction!Volume One of this collection contains issues #1-6 of this startling series.

Multiforce


Mat Brinkman - 2009
    22 big pages of some of the best comic strips I've ever seen. PictureBox scanned and carefully retouched these pages in collaboration with Brinkman. Come with Brinkman as he creates, explores and explodes his visual universe. Deeply personal, extravagantly visual, often hilarious: Multiforce is nothing short of a masterpiece.

Too Much Coffee Man Omnibus


Shannon Wheeler - 2009
    Who would have ever guessed that ten years later, he would have multiple volumes of critically acclaimed cartoons under his belt and a rich, satisfying career? The Too Much Coffee Man Omnibus gathers all of the cartoons from four hilarious volumes of work, bringing together all of Wheeler's signature satire and sweetness in one convenient package. Essential for Too Much Coffee Man fans, and sure to convert new ones!

Soft City


Pushwagner - 2009
    Though it was found in 2002, Brofoss didn’t learn of the discovery until some segments were published.Soft City is both a creation of its time and timeless: the almost hallucinatory story of a society tight in the grip of an omnipresent corporation, one that employs them, feeds them, informs them, entertains them–but which may or may not be what it seems. It conveys the political sentiments of its time in a simple, pure line offering only meager spots of color.This pictorial novel describes the standardized daily life in an Orwellian, dystopian city. With compassion, feeling for the absurd and a sometimes satirical view, Pushwagner perceives the life of a family in a top-down organized city.

Nine Ways to Disappear


Lilli Carré - 2009
    Skillfully drawn single panels explore a rich imagined world where actions have unexpected consequences and loneliness pervades, but not without a sense of the absurd. The stories read like vignettes that can span a day or decades, all drawn within a bordered page in intimate detail.Each story unfolds quickly and features characters that run the gamut: joke-writing sisters gone awry, a wandering sleepwalker, a pearl with curious properties, an elusive coughing neighbor, a wide-eyed girl of questionable appeal, even a storm drain. Whether animate or inanimate, sweet or monstrous, Lilli has the ability to infuse them all with pathos, humanity, and humor.

Luba


Gilbert Hernández - 2009
    But he soon picked up the story of Luba: The hammer-wielding matriarch had emigrated to the U. S. where she contended not only with an unwelcoming new culture but also her extended family. These "America" stories - over 80 of them, ranging from quick one-page blackout sketches to graphic novellas—were originally published in a number of different comics and reprinted in a trilogy of oversized paperbacks. Luba collects in one compact, affordable hardcover the entirety of these tales, showcasing Gilbert Hernandez's wicked wit, great compassion, and uncanny understanding of how human beings love, squabble, and ultimately find a way to make it through this life.

The Brinkley Girls: The Best of Nell Brinkley's Cartoons from 1913-1940


Nell Brinkley - 2009
    This sumptuously designed oversized hardcover collects Brinkley's breathtakingly spectacular, exquisitely colored full page art from 1913 to 1940. Here are her earliest silent movie serial-inspired adventure series, "Golden Eyes" and Her Hero, "Bill"; her almost too romantic series, Betty and Billy and Their Love Through the Ages; her snappy flapper comics from the 1920s; her 1937 pulp magazine-inspired Heroines of Today. Included are photos of Nell, reproductions of her hitherto unpublished paintings, and an informative introduction by the book's editor, Trina Robbins.In 1907, at the tender age of 22, Nell Brinkley came to New York to draw for the Hearst syndicate. Within a year, she had become a household name. Flo Ziegfeld dressed his dancers as "Brinkley Girls" in the Ziegfeld Follies. Three popular songs were written about her.Women, aspiring to the masses of curly hair with which Nell adorned her fetching and idealized creations, could buy Nell Brinkley Hair Curlers for ten cents a card. Young girls cut out and saved her drawings, copied them, colored them, and pasted them in scrapbooks. The Brinkley Girls took over from the Gibson Girls.Nell Brinkley widened her scope to include pen and ink depictions of working women. Brinkley used her fame to campaign for better working conditions and higher pay for women who had joined in the war effort, and who were suffering economic and social dislocation due to acting on their patriotism. Unlike most of her contemporaries, she drew women of different races and cultures. Except among a small group of avid collectors, she has been unjustly forgotten...until now.Nominated for two 2010 Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards (Best Archival Collection/Project: Strips; Best Publication Design).

Dar: A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary, Volume One


Erika Moen - 2009
    Along the way there are many vignettes about sex, farts, the queer community, the Brits, vibrators and figuring out sexual identity. The first DAR volume, collecting re-toned strips from 2006-2009 of the award-winning weekly webcomic —PLUS bonus, behind-the-scenes material!DAR Volume 1 (A Super Girly Top Secret Comic Diary)ASIN: 0982343701Title: DAR Volume 1Binding: PaperbackPublication date: 2009

Romantically Apocalyptic - Book 1


Vitaly S. Alexius - 2009
    I stopped counting a while ago, and therefore not sure what day it is. Humanity is virtually wiped out in a nuclear holocaust. Me and my last squad: pilot and sniper, live in the wasteland ruins of tomorrow.This is my story.I am captain.

The Rocketeer: The Complete Adventures


Dave Stevens - 2009
    With completely re-mastered art and coloring, Dave Stevens' masterpiece soars off the page as it never has before-and looks as stunningly beautiful as it always should have.This collection contains more than 130 pages of supplemental material: sketches, preliminaries, character designs, script pages, photographs, and original art pages, as well as commentary by Dave Stevens and several of his peers, who occasionally assisted him on The Rocketeer.The Rocketeer: The Complete Adventures Deluxe Edition was honored with three Harvey Awards and won the 2010 Eisner Award for Best Archival Collection/Project-Comic Books.

Homestuck, Act 1: The Note Desolation Plays


Andrew Hussie - 2009
    

The Book of Genesis


Robert Crumb - 2009
    Crumb, the legendary illustrator, reveals here the story of Genesis in a profoundly honest and deeply moving way. Originally thinking that he would do a take off of Adam and Eve, Crumb became so fascinated by the Bible’s language, “a text so great and so strange that it lends itself readily to graphic depictions,” that he decided instead to do a literal interpretation using the text word for word in a version primarily assembled from the translations of Robert Alter and the King James bible.As Crumb writes in his introduction, “the stories of these people, the Hebrews, were something more than just stories. They were the foundation, the source, in writing of religious and political power, handed down by God himself.” Crumb’s Book of Genesis, the culmination of 5 years of painstaking work, is a tapestry of detail and storytelling.

The Legion of Super-Heroes: Life and Death of Ferro Lad


Jim Shooter - 2009
    Collecting ADVENTURE COMICS #346, 347, 352-355 and 357! The Legion battles both the Fatal Five and the Sun Eater – and only the ultimate sacrifice can save Ferro Lad's friends!

I Want You #1


Lisa Hanawalt - 2009
    This issue tackles interspecies romance, freeway accidents, bug sex, and animal obsessions with a sense of humor equally sophisticated and crass. But don't be fooled: This is one of the most genre-defying, formally inventive comic books of the last decade. It features narrative comics, illustrated lists, newspaper-style color comics, plus so much more. And Hanawalt draws some of the most attractive, skillfully rendered animals in absurd hats you'll ever see.

Dungeon: Zenith - Vol. 3: Back in Style


Joann Sfar - 2009
    Two stories continue the heyday of Dungeon, in the first, Isis is to be married to the Keeper but she wants Herbert! Besides, the whole affair promises to ruin the Dungeon completely. In the second, besides the continued Keeper financial mishaps, Herbert wishes to make his comeback to his hometown where his name is mud. He disguises himself with a potion that makes him the mask of death . Only one problem: if he laughs, he becomes himself again!

Map of My Heart


John Porcellino - 2009
    In this collection, while Porcellino is living in isolation and experiencing the pain of divorce, he crafts a melancholic, tender graphic ballad of heartbreak and reflection.Known for his sad, quiet honesty rendered in his signature deceptively minimalist style, Porcellino has a command of graphic storytelling as sophisticated as the medium's more visually intricate masters. Few other artists are able to so expertly contemplate the sadness, beauty, and wonder of life in so few lines.

The Trial of Sherlock Holmes


Leah Moore - 2009
    Will Watson's efforts save his friend or condemn him? Written by Leah Moore and John Reppion with reverence and a modern edge, and featuring striking illustrations from artist Aaron Douglas, The Trial of Sherlock Holmes captures all the suspense and splendor of Doyle's Victorian-era masterpieces! Also, this collected edition includes bonus materials such as script pages, annotations, a cover gallery, and a complete Sherlock Holmes short story by Arthur Conan Doyle with new illustrations.

The Wrong Place


Brecht Evens - 2009
    Robbie's sexual energy captivates the attention of men and women alike; his literal and figurative brightness is a startling foil to the dreariness of his childhood friend, Francis. With a hand as sensitive as it is exuberant, Brecht Evens's first graphic novel in English captures the strange chemistry of social interaction as easily as he portrays the fragmented nature of identity. The Wrong Place contrasts life as it is, angst-ridden and awkward, with life as it can be: spontaneous, uninhibited, and free.

The TOON Treasury of Classic Children's Comics


Art Spiegelman - 2009
    The comics have been culled from the Golden Age of comic books, roughly the 1940s through the early 1960s, and feature the best examples of works by such renowned artists and writers as Carl Barks, John Stanley, Sheldon Mayer, Walt Kelly, Basil Wolverton, and George Carlson, among many, many others.Organizing the book into five categories (Hey, Kids!; Funny Animals; Fantasyland; Story Time!; and Wacky & Weird), Spiegelman and Mouly use their expertise in the area of comics to frame each category with an introductory essay, and provide brief biographies of the artists. The TOON Treasury of Classic Children's Comics is essential reading for kids of all ages..F&P level: T

Star Trek Omnibus Vol. 2 - The Early Voyages


Dan Abnett - 2009
    The entire 17-issue Star Trek: Early Voyages series is collected in its entirety in this massive volume

Sleeper Car


Theo Ellsworth - 2009
    This small collection of short stories features gambling robots, a thrilling space mission, a whimsical train ride and a coterie of generous sky gnomes. With his unique blend of humor, wild creativity, and artwork as intricate as ever, Ellsworth realizes worlds unknown. Sleeper Car is about discovery, exploration and the benefits of letting your imagination guide you.

Nancy, Volume 1


John Stanley - 2009
    Most famous for scripting the adventures of Marjorie Henderson Buell’s Little Lulu, John Stanley is one of comics’ secret geniuses. He provided a visual rough draft for all the comics he wrote and then handed off these “scripts” for someone else to render the finished art. No matter what comic he was writing, he breathed life into his characters. In Stanley’s comics, Nancy is no longer a crabby cipher but a hilarious, brilliant, scheming, duplicitous, honest, and loyal little kid—a real little kid. Her adventures with her best friend, the comically destitute Sluggo, involve moneymaking schemes to afford ice-cream sodas, botched trips to the corner store for Nancy’s Aunt Fritzi, and comically raucous attempts to remove loose teeth.Drawn & Quarterly is launching several kid-friendly volumes of Nancy and Nancy and Sluggo as companion volumes to Melvin Monster and Dark Horse’s Little Lulu volumes. The books are designed by Seth (The Complete Peanuts; Melvin Monster; Clyde Fans; It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken).

Mini-Marvels: Secret Invasion Digest


Chris Giarrusso - 2009
    All-ages fun featuring the wild and crazy kid counterparts to Marvel's greatest heroes! Here come the Mini Marvels in their second comedy/adventure digest! Featuring Spidey, Wolverine, Iron Man, Hulk and more Marvel favorites - reimagined for an all-ages audience!

Showcase Presents: Doom Patrol, Vol. 1


Arnold Drake - 2009
    Led by their wheelchair-bound chief, Niles Calder, three outcasts of society - Negative Man, Elasti-Girl and Robotman - take the qualities that make them freaks and become heroes. Together, the trio would take on bizarre menaces including General Immortus, The Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man and The Brotherhood of Evil!The most unusual heroes of all star in this new SHOWCASE PRESENTS volume, collecting MY GREATEST ADVENTURE #80-87, DOOM PATROL #88-101 and CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN #48.

I Still Live Biography of a Spiritualist


Annie Murphy - 2009
    A Gothic black & white graphic novelette that is part autobiography, part history and part biography of the spiritualist movement in America during the 1800's.

Incognito


Ed Brubaker - 2009
    but all you could think about were the days when the rules didn't apply to you? Could you be a humdrum office clerk after being the best at years of leaving destruction in your wake? And what if you couldn't stand it? What would you do then? Incognito - a twisted mash-up of noir and super-heroics - by best-selling creators Criminal and Sleeper: Ed Brubaker (The Death of Captain America), Sean Phillips (Marvel Zombies), Val Staples on colors.Collecting: Incognito 1-6

Summer Wars


Kyouhei Iwai - 2009
    Natsuki’s family, the Jinnouchi clan, dates back to the Muromachi era, and they’ve all come together to celebrate the 90th birthday of the spunky matriarch of the family, Sakae. That’s when Kenji discovers his “summer job” is to pretend to be Natsuki’s fiancé and dance with her at the birthday celebration. As Kenji attempts to keep up with Natsuki’s act around her family, he receives a strange math problem on his cell phone which, being a math genius, he can’t resist solving. As it turns out, the solution to the mysterious equation causes a hijacking of the social networking site through which most of the world's social and business traffic flows.

Tomb


Eric Colossal - 2009
    Now also available for purchase.

Captain Easy, Soldier of Fortune, Vol. 1: The Complete Sunday Newspaper Strips, 1933-1935


Roy Crane - 2009
    Begun in 1924 under theeponymous title Wash Tubbs, within four months it moved from a gag-a-day strip about a girl-crazy young grocery store clerk to an adventurestrip when Wash Tubbs embarks on a treasure hunt. Captain Easy wasintroduced in 1929 and began starring in his own Sunday page in 1933, which begins our first volume of Captain Easy.The first of six volumes contains the earliest Sunday pages from 1933to 1935. In his first adventure, Captain Easy visits a lost city, battles pirates, dons a deep-sea diving suit to explore a sunken ruinin search of treasure, and everywhere he goes, he finds beautifulwomen a lost princess, a pirate queen, a savage woman in need of taming. A romantic adventurer from a less politically correct age, Captain Easy is a Soldier of Fortune whose bravery and daring areexceeded only by his Southern gallantry.Crane created the template for the adventure strip, combiningadventure and humor in a Bigfoot cartooning style that perfectlyconveyed the tongue-in-check tone and light-hearted thrills that keptreaders on the edge of their seats. As comics historian Brian Walkerput it, the artist s patented visual storytelling technique blendedhumor, drama, heroics, and pretty girls. Crane s Captain Easyinfluenced virtually every cartoonist who followed him from ChesterGould (Dick Tracy) to Milton Caniff (Terry and the Pirates) and evenHollywood s adventure movies starring the likes of Cary Grant or ErrolFlynn adopted Crane s tone of two-fisted, good-natured derring-do.Citing Crane s influence on comics, the artist Gil Kane once said, Superman was Captain Easy; Batman was Captain Easy. According tocomic strip historian Richard Marschall, Crane was a master not onlyof storytelling but of the art form, developing expressive techniquesand a whole dictionary of conventions and signs for future comic stripartists. The first volume of Captain Easy also features some of the best andrarest art that Roy Crane created for special occasions, as well asillustrations from the sketchbooks he draw when he traveled to exoticlocales to gather inspiration for Captain Easy s adventures, as well as biographical and critical introductions to Crane and hiswork.

The Marshal Law Omnibus


Pat Mills - 2009
    It's my job to change their thinking. Sometimes this can prove fatal." In a twisted, decadent future not so far away, the city once called San Francisco is now a war zone. The government has commissioned living weapons of mass destruction to wage war on terror. The survivors return home broken, bitter, insane - and almost unstoppable! Some form gangs, some go psycho. Some turn into A-list celebrities with A-bomb fists. Only one man knows the dark secrets these so-called "heroes" are hiding. Only one man has the power to take on America's best and brightest and bring them to justice. His eyes will reflect the rocket's red glare. He is the twilight's last gleaming. He is... MARSHAL LAW! At long last, Top Shelf presents a revolutionary epic over twenty years in the making: The Marshal Law Omnibus, a super-deluxe, one-volume, full-color, 512-page definitive collection of the groundbreaking series by British comics legends Pat Mills (Judge Dredd) and Kevin O'Neill (League of Extraordinary Gentlemen).

Alias: Ultimate Collection, Vol. 1


Brian Michael Bendis - 2009
    Once upon a time, she was a costumed super hero, but not a very good one. Now a chain-smoking, self-destructive alcoholic with a mean inferiority complex, Jones is the owner and sole employee of Alias Investigations - a small, private-investigative firm specialising in superhuman cases.

Our Sentence is Up: Seeing Grant Morrison's The Invisibles


Patrick Meaney - 2009
    But it's also frequently written off as incomprehensible. Using a conversational, accessible style, Patrick Meaney (director of GRANT MORRISON: TALKING WITH GODS) opens up THE INVISIBLES through in-depth analysis that makes sense of the series's complicated ideas, fractured chronology, and delirious blend of fiction and reality. Meaney also explores how the series's fictional conspiracy theories fare in the wake of 9/11 and the War on Terror. The book includes an extensive interview with Grant Morrison and an introduction by Timothy Callahan (author of GRANT MORRISON: THE EARLY YEARS). From Sequart Research & Literacy Organization. More info at http: //Sequart.org

Melvin Monster, Volume 1


John Stanley - 2009
    In fact, the Lulu work is a small part of his output; he drew and continued to write many other comics—notably his work on the 1960s teen comics from Dell (Thirteen, Dunc and Loo, and Kookie) and his monster comedy strip, Melvin Monster. Drawn & Quarterly is planning to launch an extensive reprinting of much of Stanley’s work in discrete volumes. The first in this series is the two-volume Melvin Monster collection featuring all ten issues about the oddball monster boy who just wants to be good, go to school, and do as he’s told. Designed to fit nicely with Drawn & Quarterly’s reprinting of Tove Jansson’s Moomin series, these comics are great reading for all ages. Stanley’s reputation as a great storyteller and visual comedian is richly deserved—few golden- or silver-age comics stand the test of time the way these comics do.

The Batman Annuals, Vol. 1


Bill Finger - 2009
    This new hardcover collects the first three BATMAN ANNUALS, including retellings of Batman's origin, secrets of the Batcave, Batman and Robin's most thrilling escapes and much more!

The Collected Doug Wright, Vol. 1


Doug Wright - 2009
    Compiled in cooperation with Doug Wright’s family, it draws from thousands of pieces of art, pictures, letters, and the artist’s own journals to provide a fully rounded view of Wright, both as a cartoonist and as an individual.Volume One follows the artistic development of the British-born cartoonist from his earliest unpublished work to the first days of his most enduring comic strip, Nipper. First published in 1949, a full year before the debut of Peanuts, this wordless strip perfectly captured the humorous—and frustrating—side of parenting for several generations of both young and old. Remembered by many for Wright’s cartoon children’s striped shirts and bald heads, Nipper quickly grew into a Canadian phenomenon.Designed by the acclaimed cartoonist and Peanuts designer Seth and featuring a biographical essay by the writer Brad Mackay, this lavish hardcover collection gives Wright’s career the recognition it has long been due. The introduction is by one of the most famous working cartoonists today, Lynn Johnston of the syndicated heavyweight comic strip For Better or For Worse.“I don’t think I’d have had the basics needed to do a syndicated comic strip had it not been for Doug Wright” (Lynn Johnston, from the introduction).

Tarzan Archives: The Jesse Marsh Years Volume 3


Gaylord DuBois - 2009
    Marsh's nineteen-year collaboration with writer Gaylord DuBois defined Edgar Rice Burroughs's iconic jungle lord for an entire generation of young readers, and the massive body of work they produced continues to influence comic artists to this day.

Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan: The Jesse Marsh Years Volume 2


Gaylord DuBois - 2009
    DuBois and Marsh's nineteen-year collaboration on Tarzan produced a legendary body of work and an enduring vision of one of the world's foremost adventure icons. Marsh's art enthralled an entire generation of comics readers, influencing future creators Los Bros. Hernandez and earning the acclaim of such fellow professionals as Russ Manning and Alex Toth

Angelus #1


Ron Marz - 2009
    To complicate matters she must sort out her undefined relationship with Finch while maintaining control of the Angelus host, some of whom covet her power.

Angel: Smile Time


Brian Lynch - 2009
    Collecting the plushests tales from IDW's Angel-verse!From the same team behind IDW's bestselling series from creator Joss Whedon, Angel: After the Fall, comes three tales about the fan-favorite puppet characters! This collection features the re-adaptation of the fan-favorite episode Smile Time, the mini-series Shadow Puppets (which include puppet Spike and Lorne), and atale of sweet pupppety love on Angel's first date from the special collection Angel: Masks.